In 2018, the airport saw 89.1 million passengers, short of its 90.3 million target but still a one-percent increase over 2017. Not only does Dubai International hold the title, but it's held the title since 2014, when it overtook London Heathrow. (It currently serves nine million more passengers than the European hub.)

Dubai has had the world's busiest international airport for five years in a row.

Alisdair Miller/Courtesy Dubai Airports

Dubai International hosts more than 100 airlines, and flies to more than 260 destinations around the world. Its location is notable: The airport is within four hours flying of one-third of the world’s population, and within eight hours of two-thirds. It's also home to long-haul carrier Emirates, voted one of the world's best airlines in our Readers' Choice Awards, which has helped transform the airport into one of the world's go-to stopover destinations for travelers on their way to—or from—places like Budapest, Beijing, and Boston. Three in five Emirates fliers, in fact, are connecting to somewhere else. India, with 12.2 million travelers, is the airport's largest market, followed by Saudi Arabia, with 6.4 million.

But what's to come for the hub? Dubai International CEO Paul Griffiths [told Bloomberg] in 2018 that the airport expects double-digit passenger growth in 2019, thanks in large part due to closer ties between Emirates and the government-owned, low-cost airline flydubai, which moved 11 flights to Terminal 3 to ease connections between the two airlines. Longer term, Griffiths has said Dubai International will look to overtake Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson and Beijing Capital airports as the world's busiest airport, period, by 2021; Beijing Capital saw 95.8 million passengers in 2017, while Atlanta retained its title, with 103.9 million passengers. Sounds like Dubai.

This article was originally published in 2017. It has been updated with new information.